1. Field of the Invention
Aspects of the present invention relate to an image forming device having multi-ports, a host to provide a communication port, and methods to provide a communication port, and more particularly to an image forming device which provides information on multi-ports, a host to provide an optimum communication port using the information on multi-ports provided from the image forming device, and methods to provide a communication port.
2. Description of the Related Art
Modern image forming devices are implemented with a network system which is connected to a plurality of hosts, such as computers, over the network. By connecting an image forming device to a plurality of hosts via the network system, many users can use the image forming device, resulting in reduced costs, increased utility, and greater efficiency of the image forming device.
Network image forming devices are connected to the network in various ways through multi-ports. For example, network image forming devices may be connected through multi-ports using a single common Internet Protocol (IP) address and a single common Media Access Control (MAC) address, or may be connected using an IP address and a MAC address for each network port using a multi-homing method.
In the conventional multi-homing method, a user selects an IP address of a multi-port provided by an image forming device, and manually adds the selected IP address to a driver for the image forming device, which is saved in a host device. This process of manually adding selected IP addresses is burdensome.
Moreover, in the conventional multi-homing method, the user selects and uses an IP address provided by the driver of the image forming device as a print port. However, if the selected IP address is not accessible in the network, printing cannot be performed. In this case, the user is required to add another print port to the driver in order to perform the printing operation, which is inconvenient. Furthermore, if the user does not know the IP address of another print port, the user cannot use the image forming device.
Additionally, in the conventional multi-homing method, when print data is transmitted from the host device over the network, each print port has a different transmission rate according to a routing path and port type. However, the user may be unable to determine the transmission rates of the respective print ports. Consequently, the user may use a print port having a low transmission rate, even though a print port having a higher transmission rate is available.